Problems removing file with special characters

[dictum9]

Any idea how to remove this? It doesn't show up with "ls -l"

/etc/rc.config.d#: ls -lab | tail -1
-rw------- 1 root sys 8371 Jun 4 15:38 \177\177\177

[Michal Kapalka (mikap) · Accepted solution]

hi,

on this link a very good howto.

its a combination of ls and find.

http://www.cyberciti.biz/tips/delete-remove-files-with-inode-number.html

mikap

[Patrick Wallek]

I would:

1) Do an 'ls -labi' and make a note of the inode number

2) find . -inum -exec ls -labi {} \;
to make sure it is the correct file. If it is, then

3) find . -inum -exec rm {} \;

[James R. Ferguson]

Hi:

Among the easy ways to remove a file like this is to use its inode number:

# ls -ilab

...lists in octal notation any non-printable characters as you have seen but with the inode number of the file in the leftmost column.

Once you have that, do:

# find . -xdev -type f -inum -exec rm -i {} +

Substitute the correct inode number for .

NOTE CAREFULLY: Inode numbers are only unique within a filesystem.

Regards!

...JRF...

[Dennis Handly]

Why do you think this file has special chars? :-)
If you have stty erase as ^h, you can just use the DEL char as a ordinary char.

[Lijeesh N G_1]

Hi,

You can delete this kind of file with inode number;

>>Find out the inode number of this file with,
#ls -il

>>Remove the file with,
#find . -inum -exec rm -i {} \;


Regards,
LIJEESH N G

[dictum9]

Thank you, it worked.